Top 7 Social Media Platforms to Play With in 2019

So, have you made up your mind whether you should invest in social media marketing or not? If yes, then that’s great as this marketing strategy has proven to do wonders for many businesses around the globe.

Social media sites are known to be the cheapest platforms to promote your products and brands, and still manage to garner a high ROI. However, the primary questions that many social media marketers face problems in answering are, which platform should we focus on? Or, should we directly go for a diversified plan and invest in all of them? Once you are done with that, you should also think whether you wish to target audience for B2C or a B2B marketplace.

A B2C company is dedicated to selling and promoting their products and services to consumers. For example, most of the e-commerce websites we shop from are B2C organization. On the other hand, a B2B company targets clients who run their own business. In addition, B2B buyers usually purchase products in bulk quantities. Though both types of companies strive to achieve maximum profits, their nature and techniques differ with the potential audience. Therefore, if you are planning to start a new business, first you should decide what your target market is. After that, you can start planning your social media marketing campaign.

Before I jump to which social platforms can be ideal for you according to your nature of the business, I’d like to talk a little more about social media as a whole.

According to Statista, over 2.6 billion people will be associated with using at least one social media network by the end of 2018. – That’s huge!

On the other hand, 63% of online shoppers have said that videos on social media platforms help them decide which product to buy. – Fascinating, isn’t it?

These numbers, along with many more clearly indicate that whether you are a B2C or a B2B marketplace, social media marketing is crucial in generating a good ROI.

Having that said, here are the best social media platforms that you can consider to invest in to find buyers for your products.

Facebook

With over 1.5 billion global users, Facebook just had to be the first social media website that we mention. Whether your goal is to boost traffic, engagement, online conversions, lead generation or even brand awareness, Facebook would help you get one step closer to accomplishing these goals.

The wide range of user base and demographics of users signify that almost any business can find their target audience on this platform. In addition, I would say that by creating a business page with which you post daily, you can even learn which segment of the population is best to invest in. The engagements that you’ll see are essential indicators showing who is actually interested in your daily updates.

Have you ever heard of the myth that advertising on Facebook is free? To be honest, this is true to some extent. Many small business owners were and still are using this social network to promote their brand and products without actually paying anything more than their internet service bill. All they do is post on various groups and their business page. If they have a good number of followers, orders will come on a daily basis. However, you can’t expect to go far with this plan.

If you are looking for success, then Facebook Adverts is what you need to use. It’s sort of a ‘pay to play the game’. The more budget you have, the more the people will see your promoted posts. This platform lets you choose the right target audience in the form of age, gender, interests, relationship status, employment, purchasing behaviour and much more. With a mix of great content, a good target audience, and efficient A/B testing, your ad copy can perform significantly well on Facebook.

Instagram

Surprisingly, the second social network on this list is owned by the person who is the creator of Facebook. That means, he has two of the top social media platforms you can use for your business to gain success. Mark Zuckerberg, was so impressed with the potential in Instagram, that he acquired this platform for $1 billion only 1.5 years after it was actually launched. Since then, there was no looking back!

Since Instagram is a subsidy of Facebook, you have access to the same user base that the parent company has. This indicates that Instagram has all the same paid benefits of Facebook, with additional organic benefits thanks to its difference in nature.

Unlike Facebook, Instagram is primarily a mobile app that is best for sharing visual content only. That means, instead of working on creating informative blogs, you should produce attractive infographics and short promotional clips that convince your potential audience to click-through. In addition, this is also a benefit for you as 80% of people remember what they see in comparison to what they read.

Pinterest

Now that we have covered the two primary platforms that are fit for almost every type of business, now we can highlight the optional ones that are only beneficial to specific industries.

To start off, one of my personal favourites, Pinterest is the best place to be if you are operating within the creative industry and your target audience is mostly females. Out of the 175 million users on Pinterest, more the 60% are females.

We can actively call this social platform ‘home’ to shoppers! This social network is mostly used to share and look up posts related to Arts, lifestyle, outfit ideas, wedding inspirations, memes and much more. Therefore, if your organisation falls anywhere into these categories, then this is the platform to invest in.

Even though Pinterest’s advertising platform isn’t as diversified as that of Facebook, you can still run paid ads to garner more followers. In addition, this social media channel also has some organic benefits with which you can quickly increase your post reach with the right use of keywords.

Since Pinterest doesn’t have many users, many businesses have ignored working on it. You can capitalize on this opportunity and capture leads in a platform that lacks competition.

Snapchat

The best story sharing mobile app, hands down! No social platform has progressed as fast as Snapchat has. This application permits you to send pictures and clips to either someone particular on your friend’s list or share it as a story for everyone to see on your list. The one thing that makes this app different from other social platforms is that it doesn’t let you store data online. Your stories only have a life of 24 hours. After that, they disappear.

Millions of users watch snaps on a daily basis, and you can also get into the picture by uploading stories to interact with your subscribers. However, that doesn’t mean that this social media network is fit for all businesses. Snapchat is popular amongst the younger demographic, which means if your focus is on selling your products to young individuals, then is an excellent platform for you. You can even run paid ads and show them as stories to your target audience.

By looking at the growing popularity of this ever increasing social app, we can state that businesses that haven’t added this network in their marketing plan, are losing big time.

LinkedIn

Are you following a B2B model? If yes, then LinkedIn is the best social media platform for you. With the help of LinkedIn, you can easily connect with other businesses or their representatives. This social network has more than 450 million users. The best part about this website is that almost all the users are in some way connected with the working world.

Unlike Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat, this social network is strictly focused on business-related content. For example, you’ll see posts related to motivational quotes, job openings and even callouts for new dealers or suppliers to get connected.

Once you’ve got the hang of maintaining an active profile on this network, you can use LinkedIn’s advertising platform to run paid ads to connect with global buyers. Thought their paid platform isn’t as advanced as Facebook’s, B2B marketplaces can still manage to generate favorable results.

Twitter

With over 350 million users, Twitter is a platform that you can use to spread your voice and be heard. In addition, you can also use this media channel to know the current trends, news and what moves your competitors are planning by merely following specific profiles and hashtags.

Twitter isn’t known for getting along with your friends and family. In fact, we believe that it’s a great business platform to learn from some of the leading influencers, business leaders and even politicians who share their thoughts, ideas and quotes to engage with their audience. If you are still wondering how your business can benefit, then let me give you a clearer picture.

Apart from the fact that users are allowed only 140 characters to tweet, this platform also has a paid option in which you can promote both your tweets and profile. That way, not only will your post’s reach skip a beat, but you’ll also experience a significant boost in your number of followers. Once you have more followers; the chances of your tweets getting a mention, like, comment or a retweet increase. Apart from that, Twitter has it all. Regardless of whether you are a B2B or a B2C platform, this social network should always be on your list.

YouTube

YouTube is by far the most comprehensive video streaming site with over a billion unique visitors every month. Not only that, if we consider the number of time users use the search option on YouTube, we can unequivocally state that it’s the second largest search engine after Google. On another note, YouTube is owned by Google, and that means if you are able to optimize a video according to a consumer’s demand then that can benefit in generating immense traffic. In addition, a video is 52% more likely to appear on the first of Google in comparison to text content.

However, one thing that I’d like to highlight here is that YouTube’s market is pretty competitive. We’ll only advise you to enter this social network if you have engaging and informative videos that will attract a potential audience. If you are able to use visual content to show your target market how your services, employees, and products are different, then YouTube can turn the tables in your favor. On the other hand, you should also go through the costs and human resources that you’ll need to produce video content. Once you are sure that you have an adequate budget to create quality videos, go ahead and sign up for your business channel.

Wrap Up

Social media networks have become a part of our daily lives. Regardless of whether you use these platforms to connect with your friends or your potential prospects, you can’t let a day go by without posting something new. Although, there isn’t any rule stating that, if you want your followers to stay connected you need to make sure they see you active.

However, when it comes to using social media networks for your B2C or B2B marketplace, you need to do it strategically. It requires a good plan and the ability to post the right content at the right time. Social media marketing is such a crucial strategy that you can even find experts determined to only focus on generating leads and traffic from these platforms. The social networks listed above are currently the best ones you could use to get your hands on international buyers. You could use one or all, but make sure that you double check if your target audience is on this network or not.

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